England 2014

On May 9, 2014, I will turn 30 years old.  As a reward to myself for making it that far (let's be honest, it was a close run thing for a while), I'm going to spend my 30th birthday in England.

I just spent about 30 minutes crunching numbers and I figured out that, based on today's prices, which I realize are going to change in the next three years, it would cost roughly $2,124.08 for me to spend a week traveling around the country.  I've worked out two nights in London, two nights in Yorkshire, two nights in the New Forest and a night in London before my flight back.  I haven't settled exactly on Yorkshire and the New Forest as places to go, I just used them as stand-ins, but I love them both.  I am open to suggested destinations.

Conversely, it would cost roughly $2,820.44 for me spend the whole week in London.  That seemed a little odd to me, but London is one of the world's most expensive cities.  I haven't decided which travel plan to go with yet.  I love England as a whole, but London is, and always will be, my first love.

These numbers include everything from air fare, hotel rental, Brit rail and London Passes, spending money for food and general spending money.  The only thing not included is getting my passport changed, it still says 'Margaret Eaton.'

My mother may have created a monster with this budgeting thing,  I took those numbers and divided them by 128, the number of weeks between now and my 30th birthday.  I discovered that to have enough money I would have to save $16.59 each week to travel around the country and $22.03 each week to stay in London.

This seems entirely doable.  Who's coming with me?  England 2014.

I'm for the Glove-maker's Son...

I'm nearing the end (thank God) of a book called Chasing Shakespeares by Sarah Smith.  I was going to go off on a profanity-laced rant in this post, but I've had some time to think about it and had a drink and I'm a bit calmer now.  This book (ostensibly a novel) is used to push forward the theory that William Shakespeare, the glove maker's son from Startford-on-Avon, was not the man who wrote the world's greatest poetry and drama.  According to her book, the Earl of Oxford is the best bet to be the man who wrote Shakespeare's words.  I have two problems with this theory, first she goes through the whole book saying there was no way the Avon Shakespeare could have known what he did about gentry life.  It makes a case that it is nearly impossible for ordinary people to do extraordinary things.  My other problem is that it takes away a lot of the legend from storybook England.

I believe in storybook England.  It may not be right at  the surface all the time, but I'm sure that somewhere on a plane between sweet green earth and steely grey sky in England there exists this entire other world created by the country's artists and writers.  I believe in Manderley and Pemberley and Thornfield.  I believe in Haworth Parsonage and three sisters sitting together on dark Yorkshire nights writing stories that became masterpieces.  I'm for Christopher Robin and the Hundred Acre Wood.  I believe in Arthur and his Knights.  I'm for Chaucer, More and Keats.  I'm for the Glove-maker's son.

Little Cups of Heaven

I come from a meat and potatoes family and I just generally love food. That being said, a few years ago, when I went to study in England for a semester, I felt like I was going to be right at home in a meat and potatoes culture.

But the highlight of my British culinary experience was by far Yorkshire Puddings. They are basically a little cup of batter for putting gravy into and are served traditionally with roast beef and vegetables. I developed a deep and abiding love of them. When I returned home I thought about them with a twinge of longing from time to time, but would then have a slice of pizza or some spaghetti and feel better.

Not so this year. I began an all-out quest to find them in the "international foods" sections of one of the many stories I shop at. They are harder to find than I would have thought. In England you can buy them frozen and just heat them up, I could not even find that anywhere. So I located a recipe and tried making them. The recipe I had advised using popover cups, which I do not have, so I thought a muffin tin would work just as well...turns out, not so much.

But as it happens, my family loves me and wants me to be happy. For Christmas I received not only the requisite popover cup pan, but also, direct from England and special ordered for me by my sister Anne, two little boxes of Yorkshire Pudding mix. The sound I made when I opened the package was something akin to a song bird being throttled.


This is what they look like in the pan...I was so happy when I pulled this out of the oven and they looked right.


And that golden brown cylinder of deliciousness is what it looks like on the plate. It was amazing.

Thanks, Anne!

Bittersweet

Last Friday, the day before my 25th birthday, I lost my job. It was the first time that has ever happened to me and at first, quite rightly, I believe, I panicked. Nathan's job doesn't make nearly enough for us to live on and I know how hard job hunting can be, I've already done it twice since we've been married.

However, upon reflection, I actually feel okay. The work I was doing, public relations, wasn't my favorite. It came with a nice paycheck, and it wasn't bad work, it just didn't inspire me. The more I thought about what happened, the more I saw an opportunity. This could be my chance to return to my first love, print journalism.

That being said, the newspaper industry in this country is in terrible shape, and I think I will have a hard time trying to find a job in it near home. But I try to stay hopeful and in the meantime I do housework and apply for other things. I'm even going to turn in an application in July to be a substitute teacher.

But, I pushed and persuaded and goaded and I finally coerced permission from Nathan to do something I've been wanting to do forever. He said I could start applying for jobs on a small island off the west coast of Europe. It seems like too much to hope for that someone will want me over there and then Nathan will say we can go...but I hope nonetheless.